The way to a finished piece is a series of many steps — experiments, trials, errors — and in the process a continuous honing of the hand to better capture the impossibilities and pull them into tangibility.

I need a lot of warm-ups though because it’s been a while since I sat down long enough to really pour hours into drawing and painting.

First I played with a potential new website header.

I finally got around to drawing a pattern design to try to print on fabric and giftwrapping paper.

Meanwhile the first page of one of the books has been brewing in my head and to get to it, or to get it to flow into my hand onto paper I must undergo the longish process of drawing many seemingly unrelated pieces until I find myself where I need and want to be. I really don’t have the habit of doing rough drafts of the same thing. I make full different pieces varying in degrees of complexity and subject depth. Mainly to get me in the flow of movements (of lines, shapes, curves) and colours. This is why I also need a chunk of time to sit and just do the drawing and painting. The sneak-15-minutes strategy does not work for me. And that is why a dayjob can take so much toll on me because it takes up all the useful hours of a day.

But this week I will only have one or two required meetings and the rest will be work at home so I can reclaim hours that would have been wasted on road traffic (that’ll be about 3-4 hours + 1 for the trouble of getting all dressed up = 4-5 hours LOST PER DAY).

Today I also deliberately made myself rest — as in lie in bed just resting and reading. I realised I haven’t really given myself a proper rest day as I’ve been focused on catching up with studio and creative work. If I don’t rest properly I also burn out even when making art.

I didn’t get to go on an Artist Date this weekend. The tax collector came yesterday and took a painful bite of my cash funds 😭

On a happy note: no dayjob work tomorrow morning. There might be in the afternoon but there’s also the possibility it’ll be moved on Tuesday. Still, nothing for Monday morning which means I can sleep without the stress of an alarm waking me up. 😊